A slum is a densely populated urban area which is characterized by a generally low standard of living.
One of these children is Lakshami.
She was named after the goddess of wealth and prosperity, though she’s never even seen the back of a rupee note, let alone what it can buy! At the crack of dawn, she’s up with other slum children, not to go to school, but to head towards the slum public toilets next to the railway lines.
She spends the day with her mother, combing through rubbish piles looking for materials they can sell for recycling. This means working at least 12 hours a day and earning less than a dollar for it. Lakshami’s belly has the distended look that comes with slow starvation: breakfast on good days is a mixture of sugar and water; dinner a dry piece of chapatti.
Even garbage comes in different qualities, you discover after years of working through it for a living. The one collected from the big towns smells and tastes better, compared to the one from smaller districts. Yesterday, she even found a mango, half eaten on one side, and despite the rotting pulp, it tasted far better than anything she’d had in days.
POOR CHILDREN
In India, all poor children live in slums.
A slum is a densely populated urban area which is characterized by a generally low standard of living.
One of these children is Lakshami.
She was named after the goddess of wealth and prosperity, though she’s never even seen the back of a rupee note, let alone what it can buy! At the crack of dawn, she’s up with other slum children, not to go to school, but to head towards the slum public toilets next to the railway lines.
She spends the day with her mother, combing through rubbish piles looking for materials they can sell for recycling. This means working at least 12 hours a day and earning less than a dollar for it. Lakshami’s belly has the distended look that comes with slow starvation: breakfast on good days is a mixture of sugar and water; dinner a dry piece of chapatti.
Even garbage comes in different qualities, you discover after years of working through it for a living. The one collected from the big towns smells and tastes better, compared to the one from smaller districts. Yesterday, she even found a mango, half eaten on one side, and despite the rotting pulp, it tasted far better than anything she’d had in days.
(adapted from
http://myownworld.hubpages.com/hub/children-of-the-indian-slums)